8. Mercy
Mercy
For the first time in years, I wake up to the sound of an alarm.
I struggle to move my body, and panic quickly sets in until I realize that I’m not trapped in a waking nightmare—Sam is in bed with me.
The warm breath on the back of my neck and the arms wrapped tightly around my waist tell me that he stayed the night after I dozed off.
We weren’t cuddling when I fell asleep, but we sure as hell are now.
“Sam,” I murmur, grabbing his arms. “Wake up. Your phone?—”
He sighs into my hair. “Five more minutes.”
I squint at the ancient clock on my wall and struggle to read the numbers. “What time is it?”
“Seven.”
Seven? I slept all night?
“You had a good night,” Sam mumbles, easily reading my mind. “I kept your demons away.”
“Ha ha,” I reply dryly. But truthfully, I’m in shock. “I haven’t slept through the night in?—”
“Years,” he finishes for me, humming deep in the back of his throat. He finally reaches over the side of the bed and blindly turns off his alarm. “I guess that means I’m your good luck charm. Who knew I could be so effective.”
I roll my eyes and crawl over him to get off the bed.
If he’s going to stay the night more often, I’ll need to move my bed away from the wall so this doesn’t become a problem.
My knee digs into his thigh, and he inhales sharply, grabbing my hips.
Our eyes meet across the scant distance between us, and he makes a choked sound. “Let me help you.”
The words echo his sentiment from last night, and my face burns.
Sam offered to have pity sex with me so that I could lose my virginity.
“I’ve got it,” I insist, but he’s already rolling us over.
The bed is too small for two grown adults, so what starts as help rapidly turns into disaster.
We slide over the edge of the mattress together and tumble onto the floor, bashing skulls and jamming elbows.
I hiss through my teeth as a jolt of pain shoots up my arm, but it’s Sam who brunts the worst of it.
I brace myself with an accidental jab to his crotch.
He wheezes in my ear and croaks like a frog, rasping something that sounds like probably deserved that before flopping onto his back and throwing his forearm over his eyes.
“I’m so sorry!” I quickly sit up and hover over him, unsure how to help. “That was an accident!”
“It’s fine,” he swallows, setting his hand on my thigh.
“I’m fine.” His phone blares again, this time with a powerful bass line.
He sighs, grabs his phone from off the floor, and swipes to answer.
“Yeah? I’m not home. Of course I’m coming to practice.
Meet you there.” It’s one of the shortest conversations I’ve ever witnessed, but Sam scrubs a hand down his face and rolls up into a sitting position.
“Water,” he murmurs, staring at the sunlight streaming through my window.
Then he looks at me. “I’ve gotta go. Practice.
” His smile is apologetic. “Can I drive you to campus?”
I run a hand through the tangles in my hair. “Um, yeah. That’d be great. Let me change…”
Sam helps me stand. “Great. I’ll see if your dad is up.” Before he leaves, he hovers in the doorway. “Hey, uh… about what I said last night?—”
“It’s okay,” I interrupt, not wanting to go down that path before I’ve had coffee. “We don’t have to talk about it.” At the sight of Sam visibly deflating, I quickly add, “I’ll let you know if I change my mind. Deal?”
A delicate blush blossoms across his cheeks, and he clears his throat. “Yeah. Sounds good.”
Sam’s late to practice, and consequently, I’m late to my morning studio class.
I try to be quiet as I walk in, but the door creaks and alerts the class that I’ve finally arrived.
Thankfully, everyone’s too busy painting the model posing in the center of the room to do more than throw me a quick glare before returning to their work.
Our instructor, Mrs. Lebottowitz, raises an eyebrow but doesn’t comment.
I’ve never been late in my entire college career, so this is new for both of us.
What’s worse is that someone is in my seat.
I walk around the classroom to take my spot by the arched bay windows and find a burly man making broad strokes on his canvas, the blocks of color pale enough that I almost miss them.
Rather than follow instructions and color batch with a specific palette, he’s chosen to pair the lightest pastels with a deep indigo, creating a striking contrast that pulls the figure off the page.
I stare in awe as he switches brushes and paints a beautifully tapered line to delineate the model’s thigh.
Who the hell is this guy? I glance at Mrs. Lebottowitz to find that she’s staring too, but not at the painting—at the man.
I force my gaze away and take the stool next to him, quickly shuffling around the room to grab my paints and supplies.
It takes a few minutes to get in the zone, but once I’m there, the rest of the world falls away.
I mix a deep magenta and pair it with a light peach, taking a page from my neighbor’s book and switching up the assignment.
By the end of the first hour, my shoulders are screaming.
I stretch my arms over my head and peek at the canvas beside me.
The first painting’s finished and set aside to dry, turned to face me as it rests against the foot of the easel.
I stare at the bold color choices—a pale blue set against deeper tones, lush violets, and a slash of red across the figure’s face.
Any blending he achieved was done messily and fast, but it gets the job done.
He takes his time on his current painting, tracing the arc of the model’s brow with such delicacy that I’m drawn in, the paintbrush tucked between my fingers slipping. The brush tips down my canvas and creates a cracked line directly in the middle.
“Shit,” I breathe, dropping the brush onto my tray.
The scraggly line is ugly as hell, cracking through the model’s torso like a trench.
I grab a paper towel to dab the paint, and a hand snatches my wrist to stop me.
I look up and meet a familiar set of icy blues, the sunlight catching flecks of silver in their depths.
“Don’t,” Reaper murmurs, tipping his head towards mine.
His voice wraps around me like a caress, sending heated shivers down my spine.
I barely recognize him in a normal setting, yet here he is, statuesque like a Greek god in a plain white t-shirt that stretches across his chest and bleached jeans slung low over his hips.
Now I know what Mrs. Lebottowitz has been staring at all morning.
At night, his presence is like a voice in the back of your mind, intimidating and powerful even while hidden.
But during the day, you’d never know he was capable of murder until he’s swinging the axe over your head.
Charm radiates off of him in waves, and now that I’m paying attention, it isn’t just Mrs. Lebottowitz who’s swayed by him.
So is our model.
The smile on her lips looks like it was made for him, the arch of her body sensual and inviting.
Our nude models rotate their positions around the room so that everyone has a chance to paint or sketch from different angles, and today, my side of the room is supposed to be turned towards their back.
But she’s chosen to forego the schedule and aim her breasts towards the frosted windows—or, rather, in Reaper’s direct line of sight.
He pays her no mind, however, keeping his eyes on mine. “Use it.” Glancing at my tray, he picks up a clean paintbrush and dips it into the paint. “It’s more interesting.”
I stare at him for a full thirty seconds, the silence between us palpable. His smile grows, turning into a smirk as he flexes his arms. “Go on, Siren. Paint. Or am I too distracting for you? Should I leave?”
With a glare, I whip my head back around and re-wet my brush, careful to remove the excess paint before returning to my canvas.
I draw a short line on the hollow of her throat, ignoring the dark line a few inches below.
Keeping my voice down, I ask, “What are you doing here?” Frustration makes my brushstrokes sloppy, and I have to set down my brush and stretch my fingers.
This is a longer studio class with sessions that range from three to five-hour stints.
I didn’t check the schedule to know which day we’re on, but only one hour has passed.
There are at least two more left before class is dismissed, and I really need to pass this class.
Leaving in the middle of a session docks points from your project grade.
This month, we’re experimenting with color and light when a model shifts their position in the middle of a painting.
Will you recover, or will you embrace the movement as part of your work?
Reluctantly, the model turns her body around at Mrs. Lebottowitz’s suggestion, finally turning her back towards us. Having one fewer set of eyes on us makes me bolder, and I drag my easel and chair closer to Reaper’s. “What are you even working on?”
The moment my eyes land on his canvas, I’m at a loss for words.
The woman in the painting isn’t tall and lithe like our model—she’s hunched over her canvas like a gremlin, but her legs stretch on like knives, dipping through the floor to touch the scratch of earth painted beneath.
A canopy of wilting leaves, looking eerily similar to those on the oak tree behind us, hangs over her head.
He isn’t following the prompt at all, choosing instead to mix fantasy and reality.
But his work is really fucking good. The technical precision required to paint the swell of her cheek in one stroke, the colors shifting from an off-white olive tone to a rough lavender, is hard to miss.
Then there’s her lips—the tiniest swipe of red reminiscent of an older Japanese style—is simple yet elegant.
I’m both devastated and impressed, and it makes me want to pack up and leave.
I’ve never left a studio class early before.
Reaper rakes his fingers through his hair, exposing his forehead and mussing up the top. “It’s not my best work,” he says gently, “but it’s good enough for this class.”
I stare at his painting to avoid meeting his eyes. “You’re not enrolled in this class. You snuck in here to torment me. You stole my seat. ”
He chuckles under his breath. “Someone has an inflated ego.”
“I do not!”
Mrs. Lebottowitz hushes us as she walks by.
Picking up his paintbrush, he reaches over me to dab the far edge of my canvas with the same deep blues on his own.
Our shoulders brush, and I resist the urge to topple him over for the sake of everyone else in the room.
I can’t ruin class for everyone. I pick up my paintbrush dipped in pure white and press my hand against his, fighting every one of his strokes with my own.
The paint mixes on the canvas, creating a wave-like translucence.
“I’m a student,” he says finally, tapping my knuckles with his fingertip. “I haven’t been in class because I complete all of my assignments at my home studio. You’ll have to visit sometime.”
Home studio? Visit?
“What are we, friends now?” I scoff. Lowering my voice, I continue. “Last I checked, you wanted to kill me.”
His hand hovers over the canvas. “I do want to kill you.” Turning his face towards mine, he ghosts his lips over my temple. “But I want so much more than that, Mercy. Won’t you give it to me?”
Tingles spread down my arms. “Give you what?”
Carelessly dropping his brush on the floor, he turns my hand over and explores my inner wrist, tracing the blue veins trailing up my forearm. “Everything I want.”
Distracted by his touch, I idly swish my paintbrush back and forth without truly seeing what I’m doing. “And what is it that you want, Reaper?”
“Call me Kane,” he murmurs, suddenly pressing his nose into my hair, “when we’re like this.” The gesture is intimate enough to make me blush, and I have to force myself not to react.
“Kane,” I amend easily, tucking this new piece of information away. Sam agreed to help me look into Alejandro’s family this week. It’ll be easy to add brothers Kane and Zane to our search. “What do you want, then, Kane?”
“You.” Gripping my chin, he turns my face towards his, stealing my breath in one fluid motion. “Will you sing for me, Siren?”
My heartbeat increases its tempo, and I find myself at a loss for words. No one has ever asked me to sing for them before… and no one has ever looked at me like this before. Kane’s touch is gentle, but his gaze is piercing, slipping into my heart like a dagger.
“Okay.”
The corner of Kane’s lips curves upwards. “Yeah?” He caresses my jawline. “That makes me so happy, Mercy. So happy.” Still smiling, he lets me go and returns his focus to his painting, suddenly invested in completing the piece.
I stare dumbly at him for a few minutes before I slowly turn my body back towards my easel.
I pick up my dropped paintbrush and clean the entire set before continuing my work, unable to focus with the jagged black scar tearing through the figure.
But I don’t paint over the mistake; I leave it where it sits, knowing that I can work around it and salvage what’s left.
With Kane, I have a feeling that I’ll be doing a lot of improvising to save what pieces of myself I can. Because if it’s that easy for me to give something up the moment he asks, I’m in deep, deep trouble.